


Soar Above Life's Travesty

by MightyGlowCloud



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: -Voice of John Mulaney-, Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, I wanted to make this an even amount of h&c, Injury, M/M, Mention of blood, Protective Aziraphale, Protective Crowley, Trauma, Wing Grooming, Wingfic, and then I didn't!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-04-12 10:43:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19130419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MightyGlowCloud/pseuds/MightyGlowCloud
Summary: A collection of wingfic drabbles (with some plot?)





	1. Spread Your Wings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley lets Aziraphale help him out after being summoned to Hell.

There were two things about being summoned that Crowley despised: first, having to deal with his fellow demons. Bowing and scraping had never truly suited him, and his brand of mirth and sarcasm had never truly suited his superiors. That tended to work itself out - helped along by a strong drink later. The second was how it affected his wings. Much like his Bentley, his wings were a point of pride. They were meticulously maintained and preened, to the best of his ability.

God help him, Crowley still maintained his wings, if only so that he could live up to that small sliver of doubt that Arizaphale continually placed in him. That perhaps he hadn't fallen quite so far as to be completely beyond... not forgiveness, no- beyond hope, perhaps? Hell had a way of stripping down everything you held dear, making you pay for your failings. Your Fall. Crowley's wings were his eternal penance. The constant mix of noxious vapors, ash, and heat made it damn near impossible to use them. After a while it could even damage them irreparably. For most demons, wings were just a symbol of their Fall - useful to intimidate, crowd, and otherwise be as imposing as a demon can be. Most demons couldn't fly.

For every second he spent Down, he felt Hell's fires making the feathers brittle, ash settling over their ebony expanse in a mocking embrace of the white they used to be. The fine powder settled between the feathers, chafing and irritating the sensitive skin beneath. It didn't matter that they weren't currently materialized, the damage was surely being done all the same. Being earth-side again was a blessed relief once he was finally released, and Crowley breathed in deeply. His phone buzzed almost immediately.

"What is it angel?"

"Just- uh- just checking in, I suppose. Meeting took a while."

"Yep," his lips popped on the 'p' drawing it out as he waited for Aziraphale to finally get to what he'd been calling for.

"Would you like to have dinner? Tonight?"

"I could certainly be tempted."

"I believe that's more your thing than mine."

"Guess we'll have to switch for a night. See how we like it. Wouldn't be the first time."

"Oh," Crowley felt a smile creep across his face as he imagined the blush rising high on the cherub's cheeks, "You _devious_ _snake_. I'll see you soon, my dear."

He shook off his wings as best as he could. He'd get to cleaning them properly later. He grabbed the keys to the Bentley and drove to his favorite winery to find a bottle for the evening. Aziraphale couldn't be the only doing some temptation.

 

He realized that delaying his little ritual was maybe not the best of ideas as soon as he stepped into the shop. His wings, which had been achingly uncomfortable in their confinement, burst out without his permission.

"Crowley?" He swore as he knocked over a stack of books. _Blasted wings._ "What are you doing?"

"Oh, you know," He waved a hand emphatically before him, "airing them out. A bit." The stack of books he'd unwittingly made fall to the ground had stirred up dust which just now reached his nose, causing him to sneeze. His wings shook out ash and he smiled awkwardly at the angel before him. "Ah. There's that too. Sorry."

"I see." Aziraphale set his jacket aside and turned on his heel. "Follow me, please." Crowley was led upstairs, and couldn't help but try to lighten the mood a bit.

"Bit forward of you. Haven't even bought me dinner yet."

"Hush, will you." Aziraphale began rolling up the cuffs on his shirt, and Crowley's mouth snapped shut. His usual demeanor of asking politely, apologizing profusely, all of it had been dropped revealing the forceful soldier giving commands. He certainly was enjoying the display.

They ended up in the bathroom and Aziraphale began running the water in the bathtub, testing the temperature. He willed a pitcher and some towels before acknowledging Crowley once again.

"Shirt off." He willed it away in seconds, waiting for whatever happened next. The pitcher was filled and a hand brushed softly against his left wing.

"Tilt your wing back for me?" Crowley stared at Aziraphale, confused. Never in all his recollections of Heaven had anyone asked for that. Doing so would horribly unbalance him - he wouldn't be able to flee or fight easily. Regardless he complied, his faith in the angel unnervingly strong for so vulnerable an act. As soon as the water touched the feathers, the force of the stream broken by the angel's other hand, he felt the difference. The water washed away the irritating grains of ash so thoroughly that a sigh pulled itself from his throat before he could stop it. Aziraphale did the same for the other wing, the uppersides of both, but hadn't broken his focus. He plucked a small glass bottle from the counter, poured some onto his hands, and worked it into a lather. His slender fingers slipped carefully between the feathers, stroking gently before working it in.

Crowley felt like he was floating. No one had taken such delicate care of him in... 6000 years? More?

The act of rinsing out his wings was repeated. Sounds were made, probably words though they didn't reach him. He couldn't tell when exactly his eyes had fallen shut, but it took a tremendous amount of effort to open them. Aziraphale had a hand on his shoulder, apparently waiting for an answer to something.

"Wh-?" His mouth felt detached from his body.

"Wings, Crowley. Shake them off."

"-'ll get wet."

"My dear, we're already soaked. A little more can't hurt." Working the muscles from the base of the mantle, he slowly shook off the water, leaving him looking puffed out and fluffy. A few feathers had fallen with the vigor of his movements, others standing askew.

"Lie on the bed and stretch out fully."

"Mmmm." A hand settled between his wings, a thumb stroking lightly over the scapulae feathers there.

"Crowley," Aziraphale moved into his field of vision, his face tight with... concern? "Crowley, are you alright?"

"Mmhmm."

"Can you lie down on the bed for me, love?"

Azriaphale's sheets were soft against his chest and cheek, and Crowley reached his hands out to grab more of it, brushing his fingers against it.

Someone was humming softly. He felt himself relax into the bed as his wings were fanned out and manipulated, pulling out broken or dead feathers, straightening barbs that had bent, and gently stroking the vanes to smooth them into their proper place. The bed shifted beneath him as a warmth settled at his side. A hand brushed through his hair, fingers curling gently against his scalp. Sleep was claiming him, as soft and gentle as the voice that whispered:

"Ineffable fool."


	2. Hammer To Fall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aziraphale is no longer welcome in Heaven.  
> (Part 1 of 2)

Crowley had never talked about his Fall. Over 6000 years of conversations and every time Aziraphale managed to get up the courage to ask, Crowley had changed the subject.

After walking into his shop today, Aziraphale knew he'd find out for himself soon enough.

On his desk was a scroll sealed with blood-red wax - typical of angelic orders - but the moment he cracked the seal he'd felt his wings materialize, unbidden. Starting from the very edges, deep ebony started a slow crawl closer. With shaking hands, he dialed a familiar number.

"Crowley. I need you."

* * *

 

"Well, angel, what do you need that so-" Crowley stopped short at the doorway, sunglasses in hand, staring. "No. This isn't- you're not-"

"I'm Falling, Crowley." The darkened feathers stretched halfway across Aziraphale's wingspan now, a juxtaposition from the pure white emanating from his shoulders.

"No!" Crowley's eyes were wide as he willed his wings into existence, "I won't  **let** it." He slid his glasses on and disappeared.

 

"Honey, I'm home!" Crowley swaggered over to the nearest desk and slammed his hand down, scaring the young cherub sat there. "Who do I need to see to stop a Fall?" A shaking hand pointed him down a corridor to his left.

"F-first one on your right."

"Thanksss." His tongue flicked out, a tell that his nerves were not as settled as he'd like his outward appearance to be. Not that any of these angels knew that. Several recoiled from him, disappearing from the room. He kicked the door to the office open.

"Ah, demon! We've been expecting you. Can I offer you a glass?" He eyed the glass offered to him. Holy Water.

"Very funny." Crowley dropped into the waiting chair, lolling back in an effort to appear nonchalant, "Aziraphale-" 

"Does he know you're here?"

"I imagine it was fairly obvious, given the situation." His response was met with silence. "He doesn't deserve to Fall." He admitted quietly.

"Doesn't he?" Crowley's eyes snapped up to the preening figure behind the desk. "Troublesome man, that one. I must admit, you've done a  **very** good job at swaying him over the millennia. Nothing too bad, of course, but..." Gabriel tutted, a smile playing at the corner of his eyes, "These things do tend to stack up over the years."

Crowley sat in silence, thankful for the dark shades that hid his fear for the angel that was surely waiting for him.

"Do you know what this is?" Gabriel gestured to a picture frame on the wall. Inside was a set of curved blades, dark metal designed to look like a feather.

"Damascus steel. They were supposed to have been destroyed eons ago."

"Not all of them. Frightfully sharp, though." A pit of dread settled in his stomach. He knew what was being asked. Wings for wings.

"I'll do it."

"Excellent," With a flourish, a contract appeared before Crowley. Gabriel produced a blood-red quill, "Sign here." As soon as his name was signed, the flames ignited the parchment, leaving behind another sealed scroll in the ashes. "Take that to Aziraphale. He's waiting for you."

Crowley stood sharply, knocking over the chair in a small act of rebellion as he left the room.

 

Aziraphale was scared. Crowley had sent himself to Heaven to do- hell only knows what!

Speak of the- him, Crowley walked out of Gabriel's office, scroll in hand.

"Crowley, what-?" Said scroll was pressed into his hands.

"Congratulations, angel. You've risen." He touched the scroll reverently, feeling his grace flow through him with a shock.

"What did you do?"

"Well, you know me. I put the fear of Crowley into 'em." Crowley winked rakishly and held out his hand. "Come on. Let's go home."


	3. Soaring Ever Higher

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley pays the devil his dues.  
> (Part 2 of 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're really working for the archive warnings and rating on this one, folks, so, please be prepared for descriptions of blood and injuries, and the emotional aftermath!
> 
> (And, y'know, language and slight innuendo because this is Crowley after all)

A week had passed since Crowley had signed the last of his grace away. They were toying with him, the angelic dicks.

He knew today was the day though. He'd tried to miracle himself to the bookstore, not wanting the hassle of driving or walking to get in the way of time spent with Aziraphale now that the world wasn't ending, and all. He tried again. Once...

Twice.

Nothing.

He picked up the phone. It reached voicemail. Probably for the best.

"Angel. Just- been called away on business, and I didn't want you to worry. I lo-" No. He was going to come back. No need for goodbyes. "Save our table at the Ritz. Ciao!"

A knock sounded at his door the moment the phone was placed back into the receiver. Crowley opened it.

 

When Crowley came back to himself, he was restrained in a large white room. It was as if a warehouse had been turned into a sterile lab. Pillars set in the corners of the room billowed steam. He gagged on it.

Holy Water. Diluted enough through the air, indirect enough to cause agony but not extinction. Shit, he had really not expected them to bring out the whole torture bit right off the bat. Still, it certainly was one way to subdue a demon. Crowley tried not to move, every tiny shift feeling like thousands of white-hot needles dug into his skin.

"Seems like some tricks  _do_ still work on you." A voice sounded behind him. He didn't need to turn his head to know who.

"Enough with the foreplay,  _Gabriel_ ," Crowley managed to rasp, "Get it over wi-"

He cut himself off with a scream as a hook tore through his wing. The smell of sulfur filled the air as the hellfire that ran through his veins now dropped to the floor in rivulets.

"As you wish." Another hook speared through his other wing. Crowley would've collapsed if his body was supporting itself anymore. The hooks had begun lifting him up, dragging him slowly, achingly towards the ceiling. He felt buffeted by wind as Gabriel rose to join him. Tears burned their way down his face as the pain reached new levels, his breath leaving him in ragged sobs.

"I must admit, I never expected you to actually do this. It's the closest you've come to rising in a long time, sacrificing the last of your grace so Aziraphale can keep what barely passes for his. Is he still worth it, Crowley?" Gabriel was as close to hissing as angels could ever hope to be, if angels could have been snakes. Crowley said nothing, trying his best to keep from passing out - though the Holy Water in the air was probably already doing a bang-up job - or throwing up. He did have a reputation to maintain, after all. The point of one of the blades dug into the base of his wing, touching bone. "Answer me!"

"Of courssse he isss!" Crowley's forked tongue flicked out, scalding itself on the steam in the air. The icy cold of the metal blades touched against the base of both wings, now.

"We'll see." And with that, his wings were severed. He fell from the air with nothing to hold him anymore. Midway through the fall, the setting changed.

Crowley crashed in a heap outside the bookstore.

* * *

 

 

A crash sounded outside, not entirely unusual or interesting until the smell of sulfur reached him.

Hellfire, that was- Well, it was hellfire, acrid and smoky. The smell of a demon's blood.

His book fell to the floor in his haste to get outside. The figure on the ground just beyond the threshold stopped his heart.

"Crowley?!?" His shirt hung off him in tatters, the edges scorched around the shoulders. Exactly where a pair of wings would rest. Two angry red welts marred the demon's back. Closer now was the smell of hellfire, choking Aziraphale. "What have you done?"

A small miracle later and they were upstairs in the small apartment, Crowley laid out on the bed with his head cradled in Aziraphale's lap. There was nothing to be done about his ~~wings~~ wounds, so he spent his time stroking the auburn locks that had fallen in disarray, crooning softly, keeping Crowley asleep with his grace whenever the demon stirred. Tears stung his eyes if he caught a glimpse of the quickly healing scars that scored Crowley's back, but he couldn't  _do_ anything. His eyes cast around for something else to focus on, anything but the face of the heart he'd failed, and fell upon the mirror on the dresser. His own tear-stained face stared back at him, red and blotchy, though his tears had dried hours ago.

"You useless angel. The man marched himself right into Heaven for you and now look. It's all your fault." His refection only mirrored his pain, and he shattered it with a glare.

"-S not." The weight on the bed shifted and a hand came to rest on his cheek with a hiss of pain before falling back to the bed.

"Crowley, please love, don't try to move just yet."

"It's not... your fault..." The words seemed to strain the man painfully, but he continued, eyes locked against Aziraphale's, "My choice."

"What?"

"Couldn't have you Fall. Need someone to keep me company."

"Oh, you dreadful beast. How could you do this to yourself?" He started crying again.

_Useless._

"I love you." Crowley grabbed his hand and pressed a kiss into his palm before his eyes slid shut again.

* * *

 

 

It took a while for Crowley to act like himself again. Much like his Fall, he stubbornly refused to talk about what had happened, explaining everything away with a simple "You know how it is up there. An eye for an eye, and all that."

He didn't answer doors himself anymore, feigning laziness. He shied away from hands on his shoulder.

Worst of all: he didn't perform miracles.

Aziraphale had seen him try, once, when Crowley had thought he wasn't watching. He watched as concentration was broken by a hollow cry, falling to his knees, back arched in pain.

Neither angel or demon had lost their wings since the days of the original Fall and even then it had been limited to the worst of the traitors, those who killed their brothers and sisters without reason or mercy, both sides agreeing that it was a pain too terrible for ethereal beings to bear. Most had gone mad with pain, stumbling into Holy Water or Hellfire to make it stop.

Crowley endured silently, his smile and swagger guarding and never fully reaching his eyes.

 

 

One night when Crowley had all but thrown himself at Aziraphale after returning from a drive, he slipped. In the throes of a passionate kiss that stole his breath and numbed his thoughts, his hand fell to the demon's shoulder, touching the barest hint of where scars would be through layers of clothes. He was thrown back with more force than he'd thought Crowley capable of, and crashed into a bookshelf, collapsing it.

"Aziraphale! I'm so sorry. I-I don't know what came over me. Are you alright?" Crowley was by his side in an instant, dusting him off apologetically, refusing to meet the angel's eyes.

"My dear, that was entirely my fault. You've nothing to apologize for." He pulled Crowley to the sofa, a hand guiding on his  **hip** instead of the arm around the man's shoulders like his initial instinct had been. He settled beside the demon, holding tightly to a shaking hand. He took a breath.

"I think-" Anxiety welled up inside him twisting his stomach into knots, and he continued in a hurry, "I think you should talk about... this. Not with me, not if you don't want, but dear..." Crowley was shaking but hadn't pulled away yet. "Ignoring this hasn't helped."

"I know." Crowley spoke in a voice so soft that if he hadn't been blessed with decisively good hearing he would've missed it. "There's no one else. No one but you, I just..." He looked so lost, tears welling at the corners of his eyes. It was the first time Aziraphale had seen him cry in eons, let alone after what had happened to him. "I don't know if I have the words."

"I heard from Hell tonight. I've been  _ **dismissed**_. They've got no use for me anymore. Saving an angel is punishable by extinction, but they'll let it _slide_. Eternity without wings is punishment enough." Crowley laughed slightly as he snagged a bottle of dark liquor off the table and downed half in one go. "Turns out you can Fall so far not even Hell will take you."

Aziraphale had no words. He curled into Crowley's side when the man wrapped an arm around him, pulling him close. They sat quietly for hours perhaps before Crowley slowly told him what he'd done. How he'd signed away his wings to save Aziraphale's.

"I... I'm so sorry Crowley." He sniffled into the other man's shirt, "Sorry you did all that to save  _me_."

"Don't." Crowley grabbed his chin and forced him to look him in the eye as he continued, "Don't be sorry. I'd do it all again if it meant I could see your smile. You are..." He pressed a kiss to his forehead, and punctuated each set of words that followed with more across his face, "the best angel... any demon... could hope for." A kiss on his cheek, his nose, and finally his lips. "I love you with everything I am."

"And I you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the chapter title wasn't from a Queen song. "Wayward Son" really worked for me though!!!


End file.
